


If Flowers Grow in Winter

by MiHnn



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV), Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Crossover, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Multiple Pairings, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-21
Updated: 2012-12-21
Packaged: 2017-11-21 22:19:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/602693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiHnn/pseuds/MiHnn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She lives her life simply while the memories of her previous life plague her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If Flowers Grow in Winter

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt : Hermione never believed in reincarnation, and if she had, she never would have imagined her soul being shuffled off to another world/universe/dimension. Around hitting puberty in her new life, her memories of her old life begin to return to her – as do her magical abilities.

She is one-and-ten when the dreams begin. 

They are a blur at first, disappearing like distant memories in the morning light and soon forgotten when she pushes her hands in soapy water to begin the day’s work.

Her name is Mara, she reminds herself. She is the blacksmith’s daughter and her loyalty is to House Stark. She does not live in a place where pictures talk, but in a small house made of stone so cold that her father keeps a generous fire roaring throughout the day and the night. She doesn’t have a mother, she reminds herself, only a father who loves her.

They are dreams, nothing more. 

So she wipes away the sweat on her brow with soapy suds before getting on her knees and brushing the floor. It is hard work, her knees hurting and her hands becoming numb within moments, but there is satisfaction there. She likes hard work and seeing the results after. It keeps her mind off her rumbling stomach. 

Even with the long summer, food is sometimes scarce. Mara does not complain, knowing that her father sometimes sells his steel for less than what they are worth so she need not go hungry. But as she works, she dreams of a full belly; of succulent pig roasted in honey with fried onions and potatoes; of warm lamb stew dipped with carrots, cabbage and peas. She is not the daughter of the noble lord and such delicacies have never touched her lips. But she has had rabbit, slow roasted over the fire until the smell of the meat makes her mouth water. She dreams of rabbit instead, and thinks of how she would like to prepare it.

Her father comes home that night with a rabbit over his shoulder. “A gift from Lord Stark,” he says before preparing the feast. “He is mighty pleased with the axe I made him.”

“Yes, father,” she says politely before kissing his cheek. She can’t help but think that sometimes the Old Gods answer her prayers.

*

She prays for deer the next day and is gifted one by Old Lemme, whose husband is part of the winter hunting party.

Mara decides not to count her blessings, but to keep praying to the Old Gods instead. 

They give her food, they give her water, keeping her belly full and her father happy, and when Old Lemme coughs up blood because of a sickness she has had since she was a child, Mara’s hands are the only ones that can take away the ache.

But she can’t save a person from death. The Gods tell her that much.

*

Maester Luwin catches her looking at his drawings the day after she turns two-and-ten.

Her father had taken her into the heart of Winterfell to bring a gift to Lord Stark who was generous enough to provide her with a small feast for her nameday. Eddard Stark’s smile was kind as she curtsied politely and thanked him humbly for such a gift. 

“Your daughter is pleasing, Mikken,” His Lordship said before he turned to her with sincerity in his eyes. “Please know that you are always welcome here.”

“Thank you, m’lord.”

Her father beamed with pride before dismissing her gently. He and Lord Stark must discuss a gift for one of his sons, he said. Mara left quickly, lifting her skirts so she could run around the corner and wait for her father. But then she saw the scrolls, piles and piles, taller than her, and her curiosity won over. 

She touches the parchment softly, thinking that perhaps, like in her dreams, it could be smoother to the touch. She unrolls the scrolls one by one, her brows furrowing in confusion as she studies the drawings and the words. She thinks about how her dreams have changed. They are more vivid, more vibrant. She can’t help but wonder if any of those words, so strange to her in her dreams, are in these scrolls that only noblemen see. 

“Mara.”

She jumps and drops her hands, looking down and wondering what her punishment will be. “I’m sorry, Maester Luwin,” she stammers, her cheeks bright. “I was only looking. I didn’t mean—“

Maester Luwin laughs softly, his face warm and his eyes bright. “Don’t apologise, child.”

She stands stiffly, her hands fumbling in front of her. “I meant no harm,” she says softly, her voice meek. 

Maester Luwin walks past her to take a seat in the simple wooden chair near the table. She always wondered how such an old man walked so well when he was weighed down by a chain of many metals around his neck. 

“What holds your interest, child? Tell me,” he says, his eyes dancing with humour. “I am hardly a wolf that bites.”

Mara shifts uncomfortably before she points at the words. She knows they are words because her father told her so, even though he does not know how to read himself.

Maester Luwin asks her to come closer. “Do you know what this means?”

She shakes her head.

“This is the story of Aegon, the Conqueror. It says of how he rode his dragons and flew over Westeros when the battle was won.”

Mara’s eyes widen in wonder. She leans closer to the table, a small finger pointing at one word. “What does this mean?”

“Ah! That is the name of the dragon he rode. Do you remember his name?”

She shakes her head again, and Maester Luwin smiles. “Would you like to know?”

She nods her head and then looks away, her cheeks becoming red again. 

“Good” Maester Luwin says. “I shall speak to your father. You should begin your lessons soon.”

“Lessons?” Mara asks softly, the word feeling foreign on her tongue.

“Yes, my child. If you want to know the name of the dragon, you must read it. But to read it, you must understand the letters.” He smiles kindly. “Anyone who wants to learn must be given the chance. Do you want to learn?”

Mara’s eyes study the many scrolls on the tables and the walls. If she knows how to read, she can read them all, understand them all.

Red-faced, she nods. 

She thinks that she will like reading. She thinks that she will like it very much.

*

She dreams that she has two friends. One is kissed by fire, with freckles on his nose. He laughs easily and eats too much. But the other, with dark hair is sadder than most. He laughs sometimes, but not for long, his green eyes hurting with the burden of something great on his shoulders.

Sometimes her dreams end with a kindly old man hidden behind a long white beard giving her sweets. And sometimes, she sees cold, red eyes and wakes up with a thin sheen of sweat on her brow.

*

She is seated on the table at the forge, legs dangling with a book on her lap, waiting for her father, as she had always done since she had turned three-and-ten five moons ago. The words are no longer hard to read. With each moon’s turn, Maester Luwin gives her a bigger book with longer words and questions her after. He says that he has never had a student so willing.

“Is Mikken here?”

She jumps from her seat and nearly falls over in her rush to curtsy. “I’m sorry, m’lord. No, he left. He shall be back soon.” She bows her head out of respect the way her father told her to, even though no one else treats the boy the way they do.

Her eyes stay down as he walks towards her, his steps slow before he bends down and picks up the book she has dropped. 

“I know this book,” he says softly, his fingers ghosting over the old pages. “I’ve studied this book.”

“I didn’t steal it,” she says quickly, her eyes rising to meet his. Mara feels her heartbeat quicken in panic, the image of Lord Stark’s blade taking the head off her shoulders for thievery, in her mind. “Maester Luwin gave it to me. I’m not lying. You can ask him.”

“I didn’t think you were,” he says carefully before holding out the book. 

She wonders if he remembers playing together when they were younger. When Lord Stark visited, they ran around the forge with his brother, wrestling like children with bursts of laughter in the air. But that was before years made them different and wrestling with a lord’s son meant whispers that she and her father did not care for. He looked so much like his father then, but more so now. He is of her age, but taller, his shoulders broader with the grey eyes of a Stark. 

With shaking fingers she takes it from him, her glance falling once again. "Thank you, m'lord."

He lets out a small laugh, his demeanour shy as he looks away. “You used to call me ‘Jon’. You used to hit me with the blunt end of the sword when I displeased you.” 

She feels her cheeks redden when she remembers the incident. “You ripped my dress.”

“I tried to stop you from running away.”

“You—“ She stops and looks away. They were children, she reminds herself. She didn’t understand then the difference between the daughter of a blacksmith and the son of a lord, even if the son was bastard born. The words she was about to say were too familiar now that they are older. “You displeased me,” she says instead, her words a teasing turn.

He stares at her for a moment, his eyes remembering the hidden memory before he says, “Aye. I did.” His smile is comely. “You displeased me first.”

Mara knows her cheeks are violently red. But then her father enters and she slips out easily, wondering if her body is wracked with fever.

*

They give her a name. Something different. Something strange. But she goes just the same and sits down to let them place a hat on her head.

There are floating candles, hundreds in the sky. And she feels at peace.

*

Jon visits nearly every day. He comes with Robb most of the time and sometimes with his father’s ward, to weigh the steel her father is making for them. They have come of age and are no longer told to practice with wooden swords.

Robb is all laughs, Tully blue eyes and a joke always on his tongue. He teases her mercilessly the way he once did when they were children, causing her to huff and snap at him, but only in the absence of her father. He treats her jovially and before long, she forgets that he is the future lord of Winterfell and falls for his charms the way other girls in her village have done. 

But Jon sits near her as she reads, quietly waiting while Robb and Theon play battle with various swords, his knee brushing hers. He doesn’t say much, practically nothing when his father’s ward is there, but he smiles at her softly with kind grey eyes. 

When his sword is made and Mara thinks that he will not return, he comes the next day and the day after that, an apple in his hand to greet her with. Mara feels her cheeks becoming inflamed when she realises that her passing comment of loving fruits did not go without notice. 

Jon does not say much, but he smiles a lot when he is with her.

*

Her mother and father smile at her. There is flour on her cheek and he wears a row of lights around his neck. They laugh with her, eyes bright behind a tree full of colours.

She has two parents, not one. 

She does not forget their faces in the morning.

*

“Will you run away again?”

Mara ducks her head and looks away. They are lying on the grass, hands barely touching while the cold winds whip around them. It is still summer with small patches of green around Winterfell. But the grass is cold, as if it knows that winter is coming. “Why would I?” she asks softly. “Will you displease me?” 

She means to tease him, but he rolls onto his side to look down at her with serious eyes. “Does Robb displease you?” he asks softly. His arm lies across her chest, his fingers plucking at the grass near her neck. 

“Robb? Why would Robb—?”

He looks so solemn above her, his dark hair and grey eyes making his jaw seem harder. “I know he brings you flowers,” he says, his eyes on the grass. “He told me so.”

“He brings everyone flowers,” she says gently, mostly to appease him. “It means nothing.” 

His eyes stay low and away from hers. “He says you smile at him.”

She raises a cool hand to his cheek, nudging him gently so that his grey eyes meet hers. She smiles softly at him; this boy who lacks so much affection from his own blood. “I smile at you more.”

He looks far from appeased as his hand leaves the grass to cover hers. “It is my nameday,” he says. 

Mara nods, her fingers stroking his neck, knowing what he is about to ask of her. 

“I’m four-and-ten.” He swallows. “Almost a man grown.” 

“You will have a feast tonight,” she says with a grin. “Arya will try to steal your mead.”

His eyes soften at the name of his sister, his fingers tightening on her hand. “What will you give me for my nameday?” 

She bites her lower lip mischievously. “What would you like me to give you?”

He turns away from her, lips brushing her palm and causing her to shiver. “Lady Stark has forbidden any celebration.” His voice is empty, sad. “But father wishes to take Robb and I hunting on the morrow.”

“Then you shall kill a deer,” she says, her heart aching at his features. “And you shall beat Robb in every which way.”

He closes his eyes and smiles into the palm of her hand. “I wish I could take you with me.”

She laughs. “Hunting?”

His eyes screw shut as if he is in pain. “Castle Black.”

She stiffens immediately, her hand dropping from his. “Why would you go to the Wall?” 

“I must,” he says sadly. “I’m not welcome at Winterfell.”

“Only by Lady Stark,” she protests. “The Wall is for murderers and rapists.”

“And bastards,” he says gently. He lets his thumb trace her chin, his eyes sad. “I mean to ask father tomorrow.” 

She grabs his wrist, stilling his hand. “There is nothing to keep you here?” 

“There is too much to keep me here.” His voice is sincere. “Robb will become Lord of Winterfell, Bran and Rickon, knights. Sansa will marry a rich lord while Arya will fight whichever husband father chooses for her. They will all leave and I will have no place here.” His eyes are soft and saddened. “You must understand, I must do my part to bring honour to House Stark. A Stark has always manned the Wall. I may not be Stark by name, but I am by blood. I want to join my uncle.”

“How long have you thought on this?”

His laugh is short and hollow. “Since I was a child called ‘Bastard’ and Lady Stark said she wished I was sent to the Wall with the other bastards.”

“You always knew…”

“I always knew.” His thumb caresses her jaw, his eyes studying her lips. “I never meant to hurt you.”

“You only meant to leave me.”

He does not stop her as she stands up swiftly, her skirts billowing in the wind and her hair cool from the weather. 

“Goodbye, Jon,” she says coldly, ignoring the hurt in his eyes. “I hope you get what you want.”

She moves away quickly, tears prickling her eyes and her throat burning. She doesn’t understand him. She doesn’t understand the way he places things on himself that others will shirk. He begs to be saddened, never taking the chance to be happy whenever it is offered.

 _Harry_ … She thinks suddenly. _He reminds her of Harry._

The thought upsets her more than she realise.

*

The day her father tells her that Lord Stark has bestowed approval on Jon becoming a Black Brother, the empty jug in the corner shatters. She is five-and-ten, and does not find such an occurrence unusual after years of not understanding it.

Silently, she clears the mess, dropping the sharp shards into a pile of other sharp shards. 

She thinks that she will never see him again; the boy who craves to belong somewhere, anywhere where he is welcome.

Jon seeks her out that night.

*

It has been many moons since she had walked away from Jon. He is taller, his hair so long that she wishes to run her fingers through the soft strands. He stares at her for a moment, his features solemn and so like his father.

“I leave for the Wall at sunrise. Uncle Benjen is taking me.”

“I’m glad,” she says. She pulls the soft wool around her shoulders tighter as she stands outside her home, her body envious of Jon who stands before her in soft leather. He has winter in his blood; the cold does not bother him the way it should. She sees his wolf a little away, blood-red eyes staring at her. 

Jon looks to step forward, but stops himself. “Your father—“

“Is asleep,” she says too eagerly. “The day was unusually cold today.” She doesn’t say that her father was tired after tirelessly crafting a sword that Jon wanted made for his sister, Arya. 

He nods, his glance falling away from her. 

“I’m sorry about Bran,” she says sadly. “Is there any change?” 

His face is a mask without emotion as he shakes his head. Mara stares at the lines on his brow and wishes she could caress them away. 

“I’m sorry, Jon,” she says again. “I truly am.”

He looks up at the stars for a moment, his eyes hard with a memory. “I thought to come see you on my nameday.” He pauses for a moment, weighing his words. “But Theon had a gift to give me.”

“What kind of gift?”

“Ros,” he says simply.

Mara’s chest constrict at the thought. “Is she as talented as they say she is?” Mara thinks she might be. Whores frequent Theon Greyjoy’s bed more often than she washes her hands. And he is particularly fond of Ros.

He finally looks at her. “I didn’t—“ He pauses, his eyes almost silver in the moonlight. “I couldn’t touch her.”

His eyes study hers too intensely. “Why, Jon?”

He steps closer to her; so close that she must look up for he is a head taller than her. He takes her face in his hands. “You displeased me.”

Her laugh is soft. “Ros must not have been pleased with you.”

His smile is sad. “I’m afraid she charged Theon more coin than what she first promised.”

“Then Theon is not pleased with you too.”

“No one is ever pleased with me.” His fingers push her hair gently away from her face, entwining in the strands at the back of her neck and keeping her steady. He leans achingly closer, his warm breath ghosting over her lips and cheek.

She closes her eyes against the warmth of his fingers. His breathing is laboured, his lips softly brushing the corner of her mouth. She doesn’t mean to kiss him, but her traitorous body does. Her mouth chases his, her lips parting only to pull against his bottom lip. Jon’s grip tightens on her as he opens his mouth over hers, his tongue tentatively tasting hers. His kiss is gentle and warm. When she tastes his tongue, she tastes the mead. 

She pulls back quickly, chest heaving, heart aching, and Jon buries his face in her neck. “I must go,” he says quietly. 

“I know.” She raises her hand and tangles her fingers in his hair. She finally understands the once boy, now a man. He craves acceptance, no matter where. He craves to be among those who do not judge him for his mother’s name and his father’s sin. Winterfell is not that place when all call him ‘Bastard’ and not ‘Jon’. But she will miss him, she thinks. She might even love him. 

His lips brush her neck and she shivers. She feels one hand untangle from her hair to trail down her spine, his fingers splaying at the small of her back. When he raises his head to look at her, she can see the sadness in his eyes. Many moons ago they were children running around trees stealing innocent kisses with excitement. The kisses now mean so much more; they can lead to so much more. 

Yes, she will miss him. And yes, she does love him. 

His expression is unchanged as she takes his hand in hers and leads her inside. Jon has seen her home before, had even played in the patch of garden before the stove, but he has never seen the room where she sleeps. It is small, bare, with a mattress not fit for a lord’s son. But her father had built her bed made of iron, and for that, she is grateful. 

Jon notices none of these things in the candlelight. His eyes are only on her with icy darkness in their depths. If she didn’t know how kind and gentle he was, he might have scared her with his need. 

His kisses are soft at first, warm breath ghosting over her skin as lips touch her nose, her cheek and her jaw. His kisses are deep when they reach her lips, causing her to feel the thrill rush through her as her fingers tangle in the leather he wears. He whispers her name against her ear. _Mara_ , he says, his hands rubbing up and down her side. _Mara_.

But it sounds wrong, she thinks wildly. In the middle of fiery kisses she thinks… _That’s not my name. It’s something different. Something strange._

She silences him with a kiss and another, her chest heaving from the lack of breath, just like him. She wishes there is less candlelight and two of three flames disappear. Jon raises his head, his expression marred in confusion, but she kisses him deeply and he forgets. 

The bed creaks with their weight. She winces with every sound, thinking that her father might hear, but Jon’s kisses are too sweet to ignore. Their fingers fumble with her dress. His are inexperienced; hers are shaky. They make too much noise, little bouts of laughter escaping them when his head hits hers by mistake. They laugh more than they kiss. Jon tickles her and she tickles him. For a moment it is as if they are children wrestling with all innocence. But then her dress comes undone, and his eyes darken. 

He studies her the way her father studies a sword. His eyes follow every curve, every bare piece of skin. She keeps her thighs together, her hands forcefully on the bed so as not to cover herself. When his hand touches her hip, she nearly jumps. 

Her whole body is on fire. She can see the way he looks at her, from her shoulder, her chest, her belly and below. But then his eyes move upwards and he bends down to kiss her inflamed cheek. 

There is no laughter when they remove his bindings. The silence is thick, their breathing deep as the final bits of clothing are strewn on the floor. She doesn’t look down, as much as she wants to. She tangles her fingers in his hair and pulls him lower, sighing into the familiar kisses. They stay like that for a while, bodies far from touching, almost side to side, with quick kisses between them. 

His hands are on her waist, but then they move upwards and touch the side of her breast. She gasps into his mouth and Jon pulls away. There is a moment when his thumb strokes the side of her breast teasingly and his eyes study the movement. Then he lowers his head, kisses the side of her breast, and she feels a moan rumble in her chest. She thinks that that will be all; she thinks that he will kiss her lips again. 

But Jon opens his mouth over her nipple and she arches off the bed. Her response fuels something in him. He licks and sucks her nipple, his hands no longer gentle, but greedy in the exploration of her body. He trails hot fingers along her spine, hands palming her arse and caressing her thighs, his kisses moving from one breast to another and his warm breath burning her skin. 

When he kisses her again, she willingly opens her legs to him and pulls him on top of her. He groans into her mouth, his thickness resting against her stomach. She can feel how hot he is, she can feel the wetness between her thighs, and she knows—she _knows_ —that she is ready. 

He kisses her neck so hard that she knows a bruise is forming, but she thinks of him and his pleasure. She traces his hard chest and caresses her way down to his belly. His breathing is harder, his grip on her hip and thigh hurtful, and when she takes him in hand, he jerks. 

For a moment, they don’t move, his head buried in her neck, his nails digging into her soft skin, but he doesn’t move. She strokes him slowly, experimentally, and he shudders. She waits a beat, kisses his brow and strokes him again. And again. And Again. 

But then his hand grips her wrist and he stops her. 

He has a thin sheen of sweat on his skin and his arms are shivering to hold himself above her. She kisses him deeply, knowing that she needs him as much as he needs her, refusing to think on the loss she will suffer by sunrise. “Jon,” she says softly, his name full of love and longing. She whispers it against his mouth, against his cheek, against his jaw that scratches her soft skin. 

His eyes study hers for long moments before he sighs into her chest. “Forgive me.”

Her heart sinks as he lifts himself off her. 

“Jon—“

“You’re meant to marry,” he says, shaking. His fingers fumble for his clothing in the dim light, his eyes shuttered and empty. “I will not dishonour you. I will not have you hate me.” 

Her throat burns as she watches his back. The muscles under his skin ripple as he moves, and she thinks back to all the times she had watched Jon and Robb with swords in their hands, moving, jumping and training with sweat on their brow. 

“You are making me hate you,” she says softly. She reaches for her covers to hide her modesty. But his hands and lips have been on her skin and she can still feel the imprint. 

Fully clothed, he sits beside her, his eyes sad and resigned. “I am not my father,” he says. “I will not put a bastard in you.” 

It will always be about that. He is never enough. He can’t imagine that he ever will be. 

He reaches out to touch her cheek and she flinches. Jon drops his hand, his back stiff. “I never meant—“

“To hurt me,” she says bitterly. She hates him. She hates herself. She hates that she lies naked in her bed with Jon sitting beside her. 

They sit for a while in silence, tears prickling the corner of her eyes. Jon tries to touch her and she flinches again. “Please forgive me, Mara.”

The name he calls her makes her cry. “Leave me,” she gasps, her sobs shaking her. “Please. Go.” She watches him leave, her eyes clouding with tears. 

She cries and cries, her shoulders shaking and her tears hot on her cheeks, but it is her room that shakes more. The flame on the candle is blown away, books fall, the table moves, a jug of water breaks, and still she cries. 

“Hermione,” she whispers into the dark. “My name is Hermione.”

She knows it with certainty as she knows that she is not human, not really. She has something inside her that can control things. But she doesn’t know how to use it. She doesn’t know how to accept it. 

She sits hunched over her bent knees with her hands in her hair. Her mind is in turmoil. She has two memories of moments. Things that contradict, things that make more sense yet don’t. She doesn’t understand them all. She remembers things that don’t exit. Things that she knows must have a name. A travelling house, moving fast through the trees, a large castle with candles in the air, boys and girls, children her own age in black, moving pictures, bright animals made of smoke, creatures so terrifying, bigger than dragons, a wedding, a circle of friends, children who look like her…

She breathes deeply, trying to forget it all while sitting in silence. But then her head hurts and her hands shake. 

That night, she cries herself to sleep, not knowing if her sadness is for the loss of Jon Snow or her former life.

*

She is at the edge of the wood, her hands around a pretty flower as the petals blossom and contract to her command. She had started small, with controlling the movement of water, but now she can control nature and so she practices the art every day. No one knows. No one will understand.

She is touching a barren plant, hoping to make flowers bloom when Robb Stark finds her. He comes to meet her often, speaking of Jon mostly. He misses his brother and she knew him just as well. 

He places a white flower behind her ear, his smile wide. Bran has since woken and he smiles more than what she had seen. “You should wear flowers in your hair.”

“What will a blacksmith’s daughter need with flowers in her hair?”

“Perhaps their scent will make the forge all the more sweeter.” He shrugs lightly, his hands plucking at the moss-covered stones at their feet. “You seem different.”

She smiles. “I remembered something. Something that I shouldn’t forget.”

“Will you tell me what it is?” he teases. 

“Will you tell me about the girl in the market place?” she asks with a sly smile. 

Robb Stark is not without admirers. He is young, strong and terribly handsome. The future Lord of Winterfell has many a young woman after his affections. “She is pretty,” he says. 

“And smitten by you.”

His chest puffs out slightly in arrogance. “You don’t seem that surprised.”

“ _Everyone_ is smitten by you.”

“Not everyone,” he says with a wink.

She laughs. “Ah! But I have known you as a child. How can I be smitten by you when I know what a terror you can be?”

His laugh is loud and boisterous. “If my father heard you, what would he say?” His father had gone south, leaving Robb to act in his stead.

Her smile is mischievous. “He would say I was being too kind.”

Robb Stark teases her mercilessly, and he visits the wood every day to do so with his wolf.

*

His mood is dark the day Tyrion Lannister rides into Winterfell. He does not joke, he does not smile, and he scowls at the music of the birds that sing around them.

“I thought you liked him,” she says cautiously. She knows that many make fun of the shortest Lannister, but she has always had compassion in her heart for such fellows. She wishes people would treat him with respect. Robb usually does.

“Lannister gold is not without strings,” he says. “And Lannisters cannot be trusted in their weight in gold.”

He does not say any more and she does not push him. 

Before he leaves, he kisses her and she lets him. No one denies the small requests of the future lord.

*

Robb Stark calls for the banners and the whispers begin. The boy king had captured Eddard Stark, they say; King’s Landing calls for fealty of the north but Robb intends to ride south with an army and bring back his father, they say.

“It is an injustice.” He pulls on the ends of her hair as her bare feet dip in the hot pools. “My father is not a traitor. I refuse to believe it.”

She doesn’t either. Lord Stark is many things, but dishonourable, he is not. She touches Robb’s cheek gently. She has never seen him so angry, so hurt. At this moment he looks more like Jon than his colouring would ever allow. He doesn’t have the hair or the eyes of a Stark, but he is all wolf in the steely gaze he trains on her. His colouring his trout but he has the soul of winter in his veins. 

His kisses are gentle but urgent. She doesn’t stop him when he lays her down gently near the hot pools. She thinks of Jon, walking the length of the wall wrapped in his fur. She wonders if he thinks of her. She wonders if he regrets what happened. 

Robb is experienced in a way that Jon never was. His tongue, teeth and lips caress her with practice, his fingers rubbing against her skin in ways that make her keen. There are no gentle touches, no looks of love. He raises her skirts, traces her folds until she is wet and wanting, then thrusts himself inside of her. The intrusion of his length burns her, but it is not without pleasure. 

His thrusts are slow at first. Robb pulls at her dress, revealing her chest and flicks her nipples with his tongue. His hands rub up and down her body, teasing her, caressing her, until finally his fingers reach the place where they are joined. She arches into him with each thrust, wanting his touch, needing his touch in a way that she does not think is possible. He is masterful in this art, and she contracts around him, her toes curling, her hips rising as a soft moan escapes her lips. Moments later, he pulls out of her and spends himself in his hands. 

Their breathing is heavy, but his eyes widen when he sees the blood between her thighs. “I thought—“ He stops. 

She shakes her head as she pulls down her skirts. He is thinking of Jon just as she is. 

Robb does not say a word and dresses silently. He kisses her cheek, an act of affection that comes from years of friendship. She watches him leave the way she once watched Jon. But it doesn’t hurt the way it once did. She hardly feels anything at all.

*

Robb Stark leaves for King’s Landing and Bran acts in his stead.

She practices, moving stones with her mind, sometimes, changing the colour of things. She becomes better, stronger in her convictions. She starts remembering phrases and whispers them to herself at night. 

“Laviosa,” she says into the darkness. “Expecto,” she says another. They don’t mean anything to her. She hopes that someday they might. “Granger,” she says again to no one.

*

The day the sea comes to Winterfell, the day that Theon Greyjoy bursts through the walls to storm the castle with his Iron Islanders, she is far away in the wood.

She is too far to know, but she hears the sounds, so unusual for the silence of nature. There is a bird on the branch near her and she slips into his skin easily. 

She flies over Winterfell with strong black wings, the smell of blood overwhelming. She hears the screams, and the sound of steal hitting steal. But it is the image of a sword going through the belly of her father that causes her to gasp and return to her own skin. 

She breathes awhile, thinking of how the light had left his eyes before her feet carry her away from the wood. She heaves in a way to stop herself from crying. Theon Greyjoy, the turncloak, has killed her father. She hates him with a vengeance. But he has an army and she does not. She must survive. She must run.  
Stumbling, she makes her way to a farmer in the village over; a kind man with two young boys. 

He agrees to take her south to the next village.

*

It is days past when she meets him. He is a commoner, with shackles on his wrist as he slits the throat of the man she rides with.

The man was the fourth farmer to agree to take her south, and he is the first to try to put his hands under her skirts. It is the first time she sees blood so close to her in this life. There was a war in her previous life, she remembers that much, but the blood of another had never fallen in her lap. 

She grabs the dagger a woodcutter had given her and points it at the man with shackles. He has dark skin, his face full of wrinkles and his eyes seeming dead to her. 

When he steps closer to her, head tilted as if curious, she glances at the bundle of hay in the cart and watches as it knocks him to his knees. Her hands are shaking, her mind preparing for battle, but he looks up at her with a curious smile. 

“The girl has power.”

She does not drop her knife. “What do you want?”

He stands up slowly, and the way he does, he does not look to harm her. “I wish to ask you the same. What do you want?”

She does not give an answer.

“You want to know the power you have in you. You want to control it. Come with me and I will take you to those who will teach you.”

“Where?”

“Across the Narrow Sea to Braavos, where your gifts will be trained.”

She breathes hard, her eyes narrowing in suspicion. “I don’t even know your name.”

He smiles before he takes a knee before her. His appearance changes and he is younger, skin lighter with longer hair, one side coloured white and the other red. “I am Jaqen H’ghar of the Faceless Men. And you shall be my priestess,” he says with a bow. “Now, what is your good name?”

“Hermione,” she says softly, dropping the knife that she had clutched so tightly. She has never seen such magic. He cannot be lying. “Hermione Granger.” 

And the way he smiles, the way he looks at her, makes her think that he just might _know_ how to give her the answers she seeks.


End file.
